Boxing's golden girl, Nicola Adams, backs the Telegraph’s Keep the Flame Alive
campaign and trades a few punches with the Telegraph's Sarah Rainey.

4:30PM BST 24 Aug 2012

It’s two weeks since Nicola Adams, the Leeds-born boxer, won the Olympic flyweight final – flooring the world champion, China’s Ren Cancan, with a score of 16-7 – and won us all over with that beaming smile and her plans for dinner at a high street fast food chain. “I just want to go to Nando’s,” she told an interviewer post-fight, instantly disarming him and millions of us.

Keen to support the Telegraph’s Keep the Flame Alive campaign, which encourages competitive sport in schools, she’s come back to her old gym to talk about getting more girls into sport – and she agreed to teach the Telegraph's Sarah Rainey some of her moves.

Now that she’s put women’s boxing on the map, Nicola wants to encourage the next generation of teenagers to sign up. According to Sport England, the number of women taking part in boxing has risen steadily since 2008, with 19,600 participating once a week at 1,849 female amateur boxing clubs across England.

Nicola hopes the legacy of London 2012 will mean even more grassroots growth. “I hope I can inspire people. It’d be a great honour,” she says. “Even though I’m a woman boxer, I’m not just inspiring women; I’m inspiring the boys as well.” Her own ambitions? Well, there’s the European Championships next year, gold still to be won at the World Championships – and then the chance to defend her title in Rio in 2016.